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Monday, February 23, 2015

Has "libertarian" ideals snuck their way into our school systems through a "liberal" bleeding heart?

From Wikipedia:

Restorative justice is an approach to justice that focuses on the needs of the victims and the offenders, as well as the involved community, instead of satisfying abstract legal principles or punishing the offender. Victims take an active role in the process, while offenders are encouraged to take responsibility for their actions, "to repair the harm they've done—by apologizing, returning stolen money, or community service".[1] In addition, it provides help for the offender in order to avoid future offences. It is based on a theory of justice that considers crime and wrongdoing to be an offence against an individual or community, rather than the state.[2] Restorative justice that fosters dialogue between victim and offender shows the highest rates of victim satisfaction and offender accountability.[3]

When I first read about it, when researching it when I found a reference to it while checking out my kids' school system website, I was taken aback by how much it seemed to be trying to compensate for the negative effects of centralized state schooling. Also, it seemed to be focused too much on the disadvantage experience by "people of color." And I can see a level of "disadvantage" for people that don't fit into the mainstream, regardless of color, so focusing on "the system is racist" instead of a system that violates everyone's rights does all of us a disservice.I feel that the most important part of "restorative justice" is that it "considers crime and wrongdoing to be an offence against an individual ... rather than the state." And yes, I edited out "the community," because crimes are never committed against collectives.

Thursday, February 19, 2015

Triggers. Everything comes back to the trigger. Should he be a striker-fired double action (really, a 1-1/2 action), "traditional" double action/single action (DA/SA), double-action only (DAO)? Oops, forgot to take into account revolvers, but I'll get to that later.

There are the beliefs that:

Heavier, longer triggers are safer

Shorter, lighter triggers are easier to shoot

Carry guns should have safeties

Carry guns shouldn't have safeties

Consistent triggers are more manageable

You can learn any trigger

Small stature shooters need this

Women need that

And all of those opinions necessitate a look at triggers, "trigger control," and everything else that might affect that relationship.

Types of Trigger Mechanisms:Single-action (SA) Pistol: The original semi-automatic pistols were single action. You racked the slide, or pulled the toggle, and the firearm was ready to fire with a pull of the trigger. For the 1911, the "manual of arms" originally required a loaded magazine in the gun and an empty chamber, until the action started. Then, I assume the slide was racked (cocking the gun), and then the gun was carried cocked with the safety on. Most operators carried 1911s cocked and locked from the get go. The hammer can be manually cocked. (Examples: 1911s and clones, Luger, highend or competition versions of DA/SA guns like the Sig Sauer GT10.)

Double-action/Single-action (DA/SA) Pistol: The gun is carried decocked. After the chamber is loaded, the operator decocks the gun with a lever or by lowering the hammer after pulling the trigger. Some DA/SAs have safeties, safety/decockers, or just decockers. A pull of the trigger cocks and fires the first shot. Each subsequent round is fired with the gun already cocked, so the trigger pull for those rounds is lighter and shorter. Some DA/SAs can be carried cocked and locked, for example, some CZs. The hammer can be manually cocked.

Double-action-only (DAO) Pistol:Every time the trigger is pulled, the trigger cocks and fires the pistol. Some of these pistols have safeties, but most do not. Also, most of the DAO pistols are based on DA/SA pistols. But guns such as the Sig Sauer P250 were designed from the ground up as DAOs. The trigger cannot be manually cocked. (Examples: Beretta PX4 Storm DAO, Ruger P95 DAO, Sig Sauers with DAK trigger.)

Striker-fired Pistol: Most striker-fired pistols have a partial pre-set trigger, where the striker is partially cocked by the slide being racked to load the first round in the chamber, and where the movement during firing does the same thing. The BATF classifies them as double-action firearms. (Example: Glock, Kahr.) Some striker-fired pistols have a fully "pre-set" trigger, where the striker is fully cocked by the slide during loading and during firing. The BATF classifies them as single-action firearms. (Example: Springfield XD.)

Single-action Revolver: Hammer must be pulled back before each round can be fired.

Double-action Revolver: A pull of trigger cocks and fires the gun. The gun can also be manually cocked.

Double-action-only Revolver: A pull of the trigger cocks and fires the gun. The gun cannot be manually cocked.

Thursday, February 12, 2015

I have many more profound things to say about the New Conventional Wisdom of handgun cartridges, but alas I have been sidetracked by knowledge that has descended upon me by podcast. Woe is me.

I have to thank the PowerFactor Show podcast for rejuvenating my interest in the 10mm cartridge. I've always liked "magnum" cartridges, which the 10mm by power alone (and not development from) definitely qualifies. It is not a "magnum" derived from a lesser, a la .38 Special to .357 magnum, but definitely is in the magnum class.

But its origins definitely bring into question the "conventional wisdom" of "adequate" power for defense.

So for the sake of studying the 10mm in the pantheon of service cartridges, I require a little revisionist history to help me get my thoughts straight.

The 10mm Cartridge, A History:

Everyone knows that the 10mm pistol cartridge was created by Col. Jeff Cooper (Ret.), was introduced in the Bren Ten, and was adopted by the FBI for a short time after the famed Miami Shootout.

But according to a few sources, the "real story" goes something like this: Col. Cooper wanted to create a gun that pushed a 200-grain bullet to a 1000-feet-per-second impact velocity. That performance approximates what the .40 Smith & Wesson cartridge turned out to be.

Is that true? Is any of it true? Let's see.

I found a few sources that stated that Col. Cooper did call for the development of a .40-caliber cartridge that pushed a 200-gr. bullet to a 1000-fps impact velocity for a semiauto. Apparently, Col. Cooper specified a muzzle velocity of 1050 fps to achieve that performance at 50 yards. He then pushed the muzzle velocity to 1100 fps as cushion to achieve performance. He wanted to have a pistol like the Browning Hi-Power chambered for the cartridge.

Well, it seems a little more complicated than that, according to a forum exchange on thehighroad.org, and quoted or paraphrased by Cal4D4:

"In the early 1970's an individual by the name of Whit Collins started
looking at the feasibility of rechambering the 9mm Browning Hi-Power to a
more powerful cartridge. Originally he was considering the .38 Super,
but Col. Cooper's idea of a 200gn bullet of .400" diameter traveling at
1,000fps changed his thinking. Whit Collins did a lot of work just
looking into the feeding geometry to see if a .40 caliber bullet could
be made to function. When he was satisfied that it could he began
looking for existing rifle cases that had the proper casehead dimensions
and could be trimmed down to proper length for the Hi-Power magazine.
With his drawings and some "dummy" loads made up he approached Jeff
Cooper about his idea. Col. Cooper lent his support to Mr. Collin's idea
and with investigative and research help from Guns & Ammo the
project moved ahead. Next came assistance from Irv Stone of Bar-Sto and
master gunsmith John French and by 1972 a Browning Hi-Power chambered in
.40 G&A was being test fired. The loads being fired consisted of a
180gn bullet at 1,050fps out of the 5" barrel. In 1973 Col. Cooper and
Mr. Collins started talking about a longer cased .40 caliber round that
would be developed with the various .45 Auto platforms in mind. At this
point Whit Collins went on to continue working on his .40 G&A and
Jeff Cooper began his work on what was being called the .40 Super. A
number of years went by until 1978 when Col. Cooper teamed with Thomas
Dornaus and Michael Dixon. Via the Bren Ten semiautomatic pistol the .40
Super evolved into what we now call the 10mm Auto and the rest, as they
say, is history." (This comment references the following deadlink http://www.bren-ten.com/bren10mmautomainpage/id3.html.)

So D&D agreed to develop the gun, and they patterned their contribution after the CZ75, which was "inspired" by the Browning Hi-Power.

Norma signed on to create the ammo for the D&D Bren Ten pistol. Norma upped the ante with velocity by increasing it to 1200 fps at the muzzle. D&D requested more. Norma settled on 1250 fps and wanted to get into production.

The Bren Ten basically flopped, was pulled from "Miami Vice," the FBI had a bad shootout in Miami, the FBI chose the 10mm and the S&W 1076, the FBI quickly chose the downloaded "10mm Lite," because the full-power 10mm loads were too much for some special agents, and the .40 S&W was developed as a replacement for the "10mm Lite" to accommodate smaller hands, to take advantage of the reduced need for powder volume, etc.

Sunday, February 8, 2015

I complain about this,
but I've gone and done it. I've used terms interchangeably and most
likely incorrectly. To clarify what I am getting at I provide these
definitions:

service cartridge: In the last post
in this series, I referred to "major calibers" as what conventional
wisdom says are okay to use for self defense. Well, I should have said
"service cartridges."

Well, that's it for that. Because
from re-reading my first post in this series, I discovered that I
pretty much had fell upon the correct terminology toward the end of it.
So a cartridge is a cartridge like a .40 S&W or 10mm, and a caliber
can be both. Also, a "service cartridge" means a cartridge that is
appropriate for self defense as a government official or not, instead of
"major cartridge" which means something that puts you in a different
class in gun games.